Theft of Destiny
by Street Howitzer
Summary: On the tribulations of becoming a Pirate Lord. Prequel to Curse of the Black Pearl, contains spoilers for At World's End, eventual BarbossaxJack and BillxJack implications. Warnings to change as the story evolves. Ch. 1 added July 11 '07.
1. Prologue

"Theft of Destiny"

by Street Howitzer

_Prologue_

-NOTE: Though this story is a prequel to "Curse of the Black Pearl", one of the bigger plot points ties in to the events of "At World's End". It'd be best for all involved if you've seen all three movies before giving this a read, okay?-

If there was ever a lick of land that didn't deserve all the squabbling over who owned rights to it, it had to be Svyatoy. Leastways, if anyone ever took a vote, that'd be how Bootstrap would cast his.

When they first put out from the Isla de Muerta, Ma Turner's boy did not much care for where they were headed, or what Barbossa had planned for them once they'd gotten there. He was still down in spirits, his heart haunted with the sight of that little speck of nothing they'd left Jack on (and there was another worthless sand-pile, although no one was foolish enough to try and fight over it, to his knowing). That damnedly sensitive thing hurt each time he turned over what they'd done in his mind, as if it weren't able to believe that its master had actually been so treacherous, until he wished he could cut out the offending organ entirely. His melancholy kept him from even paying much mind when they went to the Isla, and as he was nowhere near Hector's favorite, their new captain had not gone out of his way to ensure that Bootstrap knew whence they were headed next.

But that was at first, when the waters at the bow were the good green of the Caribbean, and the air was warm and golden with the bright heat of the sun. As they sailed on, though, the waters began to gray, and the skies along with them--making the whole world seem like a dirty slate, making him think idly of Britain. Not two days later, England did meet with the _Pearl_, but for no more of a space than four hours. Bill barely had time to stretch his legs, and wonder at being the closest he'd been to his homeland in years, before the Bo'sun went about, re-collecting all the crew. Not that there would have been much they could of done in four hours, anyhow, with how their new captain was sitting possessive over their treasure. Oh, they had all _seen_ the treasures of Cortez, and touched them over--and, yes, even Bootstrap had felt a strong yearning at the sight of so much wealth (but the price, ah, the awful price!). But the loose treasure--the odd gems and statues, the clothing and the helms--all of that was packed tight as a tick in the cargo bay, far from prying fingers, and the chief prizes were kept safe in Barbossa's chambers. All eight hundred and eighty-two of them, from what Bootstrap had been told, once he finally had the presence of mind to ask.

The rest of the crew grumbled at their shamefully short time on land--had they not just spent far too many days at sea? Yet Barbossa reassured them, as was his great talent, promising that they could take a good and well-deserved rest once they got to their next destination, and finished what he wanted done there. (And that was Hector, all in a few words: always happy to give, but only if he got what he wanted, and even then, only if he was in a giving mood afterwards.) At that particular point in their lives, Barbossa had not yet lied to them in a way that could be detected. Thus, they left Britain after less than half a day, having got little more than a lungful of the dank English air... and, as the crew happily discovered that evening, a refilled cargo bay, stocked with fresher food and, more importantly, rum.

After that, they did not set sail back to warmer climes. No, that might have been wise, and Bootstrap was already beginning to believe that Barbossa was, for all his years and all his talk, far less wise a leader than Jack Sparrow. Instead, the _Pearl_ crept a gentle course along the whole of the north of Europe, hugging the coast of all those strange, pale lands that he'd never cared to visit. He'd had quite enough of cold from Scotland, and these northern seas brought a chill unlike even that. But despite the dismay that began to cut apart his silent mourning, Bootstrap Bill did not speak to his captain--no, that would have betrayed too much and too soon. Instead, he kept on as he had, asking quiet, sidelong questions of where they were going, and why. It was only when he realized that no one else, from the Bo'sun to the powder-monkeys, actually had a clear idea of what was in the captain's head, that his concern overwhelmed his depression entirely.

The _Black Pearl _made her wending path through the north, until she met with the river her captain was seeking--then, suddenly, they were plunging both inland and south, neither of which were familiar to her crew. Here, all the rivers were possessed of fresh waters and strange names, according to the charts that Bill quietly sneaked a look at whilst Barbossa was not at the helm. The lands surrounding bore doubly weird titles--some of it was writ in curves, arcs and dots of which he could make no sense, and some was written in something like English letters, but the words themselves were nonsense. He doubted that Barbossa himself could read it all, but he had yet to figure where his captain was hiding the list of translations. He did learn from the charts, though, that the rivers had a logical end: another ocean, this one locked deep in the heart of land, at the place where the Middle East and the Far East blended together. This name, at least, was written in a way that Bootstrap could understand, although he wondered at its significance: **Caspian Seas**.

After this, Bill Turner waited, performing his duties in the silent but amiable fashion that earmarked him as a good mate among his fellow pirates. Most men respected and liked his need to listen, rather than to speak, if only so that it gave them lots of air to fill with their own words. Or, rather, since the one man who hadn't was undoubtedly dead (it had been many weeks, and no man could have survived with no fresh water and food for so long) _all_ men now respected his need to listen. So keep a sharp ear out he did, until they sailed at last from the river which, Barbossa said, was called the Volga, to the Caspian proper.

Once there, the men were all set to go on shore--after all, Hector had promised them leave once they reached their goal. But their captain ordered them, instead, to let out all the sails, catch every inch of wind they could, and send the _Pearl_ skidding like a skipping-rock across the surface of the ice-gray ocean. When the crew was slack in following his will, for they could all see the coastal towns dotting the rocky mouth that separated the Volga from the Caspian, Barbossa growled for them all to look closer. A spyglass revealed that each of the towns was standing empty, and from the looks of them, their buildings were filled with nothing but gaping holes from cannon-fire. At that sight, they happily let out the sails, with more than one man spitting through his fingers at those raided, empty ghost-towns. All sailors are superstitious, be they pirate or naval, and why not--the sea was too capricious for one not to feel it must somehow be appeased.

On they went, then, but not for long. The frosted waters of the northern Caspian soon turned a kinder, more delightful blue, and within a span of days, the air became warm and pleasant. After so long in such abominable weather, all the men could not help but drink it in. Bootstrap, who had never cared for winter's chill, oft found himself pausing just long enough to tilt his face up towards the sun, like a plant that has gone wanting for light for too long. But even this did not last: for in a day's time, they were making port at a spit of overgrown land which, the captain said, was known as Svyatoy, for now.

This Bootstrap did not understand, but he didn't dare ask Hector what he meant. It was lucky for him, then, that others were there to ask a stupid question for him.

"'Fer now'--what's that mean, then?" Grapple said, his voice grinding as he spoke. He sounded confused, as if the very act of being curious was something unfamiliar. From Bootstrap's experiences with Grapple, that was likely to be true.

"It means, lads, that yonder isle's got more names than Tortuga's got pox," Barbossa said. He did not look behind him, to his crew, as he spoke--he kept his deadlights on the harbor as they fast approached. "It be in the lovin' care of the russkies, but only for the moment--not ten years ago, 'twas the Persian isle of Pirallahi, an' by my reckoning, it may not yet be long afore the Persians get a mind to take it back."

Bill Turner stared across the narrowing strip of sea between them and Svyatoy. It really did not seem much, especially at a distance--there weren't much there that topped its trees. The only man-made structures that rose above were weird stone columns, all of them surrounded by storms of birds at their tops; he'd never seen anything quite like that before. But by all rights, it looked like nothing but an accidental island, with none of the bawdy fun of Tortuga, nor the warm welcome of Jamaica.

He'd of given much to know why it was that Hector found this spot to be so bloodydamn important, to drive them nearly halfway across the map--but he was not about to ask, and the crew was already wandering off--bored of their new captain's long-winded histories, and thrilled at the sight of new wood and earth that would soon be under their boots.

-to be continued-


	2. Chapter 1

"Theft of Destiny"

by Street Howitzer

_One_

Not long after they docked, Bootstrap found himself breaking his long-standing vow of never asking any questions of Barbossa.

The harbormaster charged up the gangplank the moment it touched with the harbor, demanding due payment for the privilege of using his docks. He spoke in shattered English, and bellowed for something called kopekyas. He was the sort of master who yelled instead of spoke, as if by making a bigger racket, he could somehow inflate his own importance. He piped down quick, though, when Barbossa silently flipped him a coin. Bill caught a flash of gold skull spinning through the air before the master caught it, held it up, and gave it a tweak with his teeth.

"Kátit," the harbormaster said, making the coin disappear like magic, then vanishing into the muddle of the surprisingly-busy port himself.

"It's always a comfort, knowin' that the basic wants of man are the same where'er I go," Barbossa said, and moved to swing a leg up onto the gangplank. Before he got a chance to plant his soles, though, Scarus stepped up, his bony fingers finding purchase on their captain's shoulder.

"Half a moment, there, Cap'n," he said. "Ain't you forgetting something?"

The look that Barbossa cast at Scarus was enough to make Bootstrap take a step back, and it wasn't even aimed directly at him. He wasn't angry, not quite yet, but that half-glare promised a fury beyond all reckoning if he was trifled with much longer. It was the brother of the driven madness that had radiated from Barbossa when he'd held Jack at gunpoint, and goaded him into walking off the _Pearl_ and into oblivion. "Master Scarus, I'm not one for playing guessin' games at the moment. Relieve me of me suspense: what, then, do you think I've forgot?"

To Bill's unending amazement, Scarus did not collapse into a whimpering, quivering pile of flesh at their captain's tone, or his glare... but he did release his grip on Barbossa's coat. "Beggin' the captain's pardon, sir, but I's wanting a bit more than a simple stroll through this... wherever-we-are. Truth to tell, I'm near dead for want of a hot meal and a beauty to serve it to me--"

There were grunts of assent from the gathering of crewmen behind him.

"--and tragic though it is, those things cost. You did say we'd be gettin' our fair share once we made port, and port we've made, so's it only seems aright that we get our cut of blunt, see?"

For a few moments, the captain was silent, and Bill thought he knew why: all the talk before the mutiny, of how it weren't fair that Jack was keeping all to himself, wasn't nothing but hot wind. Hector never had a single intent of giving them their share of that swag, and they well and deserved a double-cross, with how they'd treated--

Barbossa spun on his heels, a surprisingly light move for a man so wide as he. That wrathful look was already gone, like the coin in the master's fist, replaced by a hard, almost unwilling gaiety. "Master Scarus, but occourse you be wantin' your shares! Though I must argue with yer phrasing--I didn't forget your shine, gents, only in me hurry to run off, telling you where it lies did slip me mind. The coinage all be in my chambers, though all things bein' equal, I think I can trust you in there without me watching you over. Asides, you'll know what'll come to you if anything of mine comes up missing, don't you?"

Turner was unsurprised to see that most of the crew had already turned their backs to Barbossa, and were stampeding like kine for the captain's cabin, long before he even finished his question. Well, why not? Kine they were, after all that they'd done. They had been herded well, against loyalty and the Code. Bootstrap envied their ability to apparently forget their old captain; he might have given a lot, with how it tore at him, for that same gift. And, of course, he was turning himself, stepping off after the crew to see what was going to be left of their plunder--

"Not you, Bill."

Bootstrap froze at that simple command--if anything of Hector was praiseworthy, then it had to be his ability to lay down certain words as if they were handed down by Moses. He turned to face his captain, his heart sinking a little at the ringing echo of over two dozen sets of boots champing off across the deck. There'd be nothing left for him to send back to Will and Maggie, at that rate, and wasn't that one of the reasons why he'd kept silent all this time? "Aye, Captain?"

"Let those dogs run wild, if they must. Not you, not now. I've got a need for you yet, an' that don't allow for you to toddle off for kill-devil and wenches for a bit." He suddenly raised his voice, directing his words to a couple of stragglers at the back of the herd. "And you two--you'll be following as well, or you'll be getting no pay, now or later!" And, as if this settled all, he turned back to the gangplank, swaggering on down to the docks of Svyatoy as if he owned each peg, splinter, and drop of water--not looking back to see if Bootstrap were to follow, knowing that his order was enough.

For the moment, Bootstrap did not regard the other two that their captain had tapped for the honor of not yet getting paid. He sped after Hector, his long legs letting him cross the gangplank and catch up to Barbossa in a matter of seconds. Before he could rightly think, he let his mouth fly open, and broke his personal law: "Captain, I don't get your meaning. What would you need me for?"

The new captain did not slow down his stroll in the slightest, forcing Bootstrap to keep walking close, in order to catch his words over the din of the harbor. If he was surprised at Bill's impertinence, he did not reveal it; more likely, he hadn't paid enough attention to Bill to even notice such a thing. And that was why Bootstrap felt so flummoxed, really--Hector did not like him, nor keep him close. As he was neither blood-enemy or friend, he was to be disregarded, not much more than a pair of hands and a strong back. Picking _him_, of all men, to accompany Barbossa on whatever unsaid quest the captain was on didn't stand to reason.

"No one can gainsay this, mate: you're a fine second-guesser," Barbossa said at last. "Right this moment, I don't be needin' a yea-sayer. I be needin' a fellow who's sharp enough to strategize, and who ain't afraid of speaking up when he thinks something's gone overlooked. You've not done that task much of late, but it's my dearest hope that you'll unstitch your lips and provide me with some proper perspective."

_Some hope that is,_ Bill thought. Barbossa spoke of his hope (normally such a vaporous word) the way that most men spoke of the will of God: both with utter conviction that it would be done, and no arguments to be had on the topic. There was much to be hated in that, but Bill thought of Maggie and Will--as he always did, in moments when he felt like cutting his losses and dodging off--and murmured assent. The time might arrive when his discontent and loyalty to his dead captain would clash horns with his will to stay unnoticed by Barbossa, but that was not yet come.

* * *

The pair of them had to force their way through the stinking crowd--Hector by virtue of his wide build and refusal to make room for any other man, and Bootstrap by virtue of his awkward tallness. Svyatoy's harbors were, in spite of being halfway across the world, possessed of the same powerful odors of filthy men, tar, salt, old wood, gunpowder, and piss that greeted him at every port in the Caribbean. The only difference was that, on account of Svyatoy's harbor being both small and the only way to access the island, it was thrice as crowded as it should have been. In faith, were Bill to simply close his eyes, he might have pretended that he were back at home... but the air was also tainted with a weird, oily metal reek he didn't recollect as having smelt before. 

He wondered what it was, until, as they shoved between a particularly burly set of salts, Bill saw a wiry youth at a chopping-block near his ship. The youth was standing aside a thick mound of fur and blood. As Bootstrap watched, the boy plucked up a dead seal from the pile, set it on his block, and went for a skinning-blade. _Blood and fat,_ he thought.

And that was all of Svyatoy (for the isle was too small to have more than one big, all-encompassing town), a twist of foreign strangeness throwing Bill off with every sense he had. The signs on the buildings, once they paced out of the harbor and onto packed earth, were painted in that same nonsense English that marked Barbossa's maps. No one seemed to speak a word of the King's English. Bootstrap only recognized half the foods he saw on sale at the overflowing bazaar, and none of the fish were of a kind he'd ever seen. After so long at sea, with nothing but the same square meters to walk, the same faces and the same food, it was near enough to bust his brains. And trying to ignore the inane chatter from the pair that Hector'd chosen to share his fate didn't help much, either.

By the time the town around them began to taper off into darker alleys and quieter roadways, Bootstrap had begun to mentally block out the world--his mind drifted, thinking idly of Maggie (was she doing well on what pittance he sent her?) and Will (would he turn into a good man without a father to aid him?), as he guided himself not by his eyes, but by following the regular, heavy steps of his captain. His head was far off in the clouds by the time they reached their destination, so that Bootstrap--who was by then dwelling on the look Jack'd had when he'd stood on the plank, as if, though unwounded, he were already dying--nearly walked straight into its outer wall.

"Welcome back, Bootstrap!" Barbossa said, as Bill took a quick step back.

"Bootstrap!" Ragetti echoed, as the idiot often did, and he and his companion fell to snickers.

Turner rolled his eyes, and stepped back to see where they'd gotten to. No, not a building, but a short, squat wall of some kind. The buildings on this street were all dank and rotted, and ended at this rough-stone wall. It cut across the very road--like a fence at the end of an alley, save that such fences did not typically have ornately-arching doors carved into them. It was nonsensical, that such a permanent and well-kept thing would stand surrounded by the constant change of decay. Of course, the rasping rabble of people seemed far away from here, elseways they might have already torn it apart and replaced it with another mess of unkempt shacks.

"And where'm I welcomed to?" Bootstrap murmured.

"I've been led to believe that this rock be a Temple of Atar," Barbossa said, "although I'm not yet too proud to confess that me Persian ain't always spot-on. Asides, there won't be what we'd consider a proper welcome--they don't have much of a care for outsiders barging into their temples, so I'm counting on a chilly reception. They're nowhere near as open-hearted and hospitable as we."

Bootstrap could think of one man who might have strenuously argued with Hector's claim, but he didn't try to rattle that skeleton out of Hector's closet. "A temple, and me with naught to give to the collection-plate," he said, as he followed his captain through the arching doorway. His mother would have beaten him senseless for such a breach of etiquette; Scots don't hold to what the Church teaches on a weekly basis, she'd say, so they must follow it all the more mindfully when they actually choose to appear in a house of God.

"I wasn't told we'd be going to a church," Pintel piped up. Bill could tell that he and Ragetti were following close after; he could smell the unholy reek of tar, sweat, and urine that always followed before them. Breathing around them was like being eternally punched in the nose. "If I'd of known, I'd of wanted to dress for the--"

"Oh, they're Zarathustrans," Ragetti said. "You don't got nothing on the _Pearl_ what could fit their religious requirements for proper dress."

Bill wanted to turn and stare at the gangly cannoneer--how'd he figure things like that out, anyhow? It was uncanny--but he was immediately distracted by the small, clean space hidden behind the wall. He, his captain, and his crewmates stepped through the short hallway, and into a barren yard, innocent of a single blade of grass or lump of rock. The earth itself was stamped down, packed by untold pairs of feet walking and grinding until, as now, his heavy boots did not leave any prints behind. Before him, in the center of the yard, there was a little building, carved of the same pale stone as the walls that now surrounded him on all sides. All its doors were shut. In the walls themselves (like a hedge, really, only without a single hint of plant-life), he saw that there were more doors notched into its sides. Instead of leading into other alleys into the city, all of them immediately ended in stair-cases. There wasn't a soul in sight, apart from his unpleasant company, and where did all those doors and stairs lead to?

For the first time in a long time, Bootstrap thought that he honestly needed a stiff drink. Land was too much for him.

"Where's everybody got to?" Pintel said. Mercifully, he happened to step downwind of Bill.

"Oh, they're all cowering in their cells, starin' out at us, like as not," Barbossa said. He didn't look the slightest bit disturbed at the idea of being stared at from a distance (and why should he? So much of Hector was invested in the dramatic, in being watched at all times). He found a spot against the outer wall that looked comfortable to him, and casually leaned back against it, looking for all the world like he was a lord surveying his rightful domain. "That's no trouble of mine, so long as one of 'em eventually comes out and tells me what I want to know."

"And what makes you think that they'll do anything of the kind?" Bill said. The captain's leisurely sureness was but one of many things about him that irritated Bootstrap, but it was the one that drove him to fuming annoyance at the fastest and most reliable pace. "We're off the bloody map--these men don't know who you are, just like we don't know any of them. We'll be lucky if there's a one of 'em what speaks a word of English."

"Your contempt for our heathen allies is noted, Bootstrap, but not shared."

"... allies?" Pintel said. "Since when are we makin' allies of folks we ain't even met face to face?"

"When I happen to share a common enemy with someone, I'm more'n willing to ally, even if they haven't had the pleasure of meeting me in person."

"That explains nothing," Bootstrap said. "What're we even doing here? Not just here at this temple, or whatever it is, but on this island? You've not given the crew word one of an explanation for why we've gone around the world--"

_"Hedgehog!"_

Bill fell silent. He stared in wonder at Ragetti, who stood agape, pointing one spindly finger towards a far-off doorway. The cannoneer's one eye stared, wide and full of amazement, as if it must be twice as expressive to make up for the black patch that now covered what was left of its mate. He looked like a man who was seeing divine fire rain down from the skies upon his enemies, not a prickly-looking rodent. Uttering a high-pitched, warbling laugh, the skinny blonde scampered off after the creature. Pintel was at his heels in a moment, bellowing that scurrying off after rats wasn't the way for grown men to behave in a church. Bill wondered if the same blade that had taken Ragetti's eye had also cut out Pintel's sense of irony.

He looked helplessly to his captain, whose blue eyes sparkled like polished jasper with amusement. "Please tell me you didn't bring the pair o' them in order to get their strategic insights, Captain."

"Oh, no--they're here because they can make me laugh, son. Aside from that, nothing keeps a clergyman on his toes like disobedient children in his church, and I don't care what he calls his god, that's true across the board."

Bootstrap supposed that was true. His captain would go to some lengths to intimidate, even if he wasn't the one doing the direct intimidation. "You're still not answering my questions, Captain. What is it you intend to gain from all our travels?"

Barbossa did not answer, not at first, which didn't surprise him at all. It was simple fact that Hector was only possessed of the title of "captain" due to his treacherousness, and that treason had only been so easy because of Jack's sense of equality. He was both old and cunning, more than able to learn lessons at the expense of others, and he had to have learned from Sparrow that telling untrustworthy people certain things wasn't wise. Then, slowly, as if Hector weren't sure that he was saying the right thing: "... I suppose, Bill, that if you're to be helpin' me come up with a plan, you'll have to be in the way of knowin' what's what. Very well, then: it's my intent to assist these good Zoroastrians, and free them from the pain of death and fear inflicted on them by a notoriously iniquitous pirate who sails these waters."

Bill stared. Barbossa returned his sullen glare for a few moments, before breaking into a dark grin. "You're not believing a word of that, are you?"

"Not one."

"Thought not. Try this one on, then: I will kill said notoriously iniquitous pirate in order to steal his unearned title of Lord over all the Caspian seas for me own."

"Well, that sounds more like you, at least." Bill crossed his long arms across his chest, as if he needed to hold in his heart. It did feel like it might leap out of his chest and go running for a place to hide--these were more words than he'd ever traded with Barbossa, and certainly far more than they'd shared since the latter's mutiny. It wracked at his nerves something fierce. "Begging the Captain's pardon, though, what need would you have for such a title? You've the _Pearl_ now, and while you might not be the legitimate Lord of the Caribbean, Jack's demise would make you its logical ruler, wouldn't it?"

He could not tell whether or not this silent jab affected Barbossa. It would take more than that to rattle him, and lucky that was; Bill didn't want to try and startle him. The new captain might well have him shot for trying. "A careful student of the Code like yourself knows that it takes a piece of eight to make one a Lord, Bootstrap."

"Which you don't have--"

"And which Stepan Razin does," Hector said, cutting him off. That growling voice was taking a serrated edge, one that made Bill take a careful step back. "Razin's been Lord of the Caspian longer than anyone's managed in decades. The piece of eight for this sea's Lordship's passed through a dozen hands in as many years; with the war betwixt the Persians and the Russians, it's oft depended only on which side's got more territory, the Shah or the Tsar. Right now, Peter the Great's got the tightest strangle-hold, and it were inevitable that a russkie like Razin would step up and take the Lordship. Only he's managed to hold onto it, much to everyone's horror."

"Why to their horror?"

"The trouble with Razin," he went on, predictably ignoring Bill, "be that he's something of a charming folk-hero to the Russian peasants. They all but worship him, and Peter wants to keep 'em joyous and unmindful of rebellion. So when Razin brings his fleet to Russian ports and bombards them 'till they're naught but ash, Peter issues out pardons to protect him, else the peasants revolt at the news of his execution. The Tsarists be afraid of even speaking ill against Razin, and so it goes that not a Russian on this or any isle would give us a mite o' truth about where his fleet makes berth, or what his weak points be. Fortunately for our purposes, the Russians aren't the only ones what suffer from his attacks. In truth, any isle in these waters that bears Zoroastrians, or their fire-temples, is a target o' his, and unlike his raids on Russian ports, he's yet to leave a single survivor when he bombards the fire-worshipers. Ergo, they are bound to be more forthcoming than their occupiers."

"So I see." Bootstrap looked to the skies--and it was strange, to be surrounded by walls, yet able to look up at cool blue and thin clouds. "How'd you happen to come across all this information, Captain? It all seems a trifle detailed, especially from someone who ain't yet a Lord. It's certain that no one in the Caribbean's even heard of such a man as Razin. Did Jack tell you of him?"

Hector said nothing.

* * *

"There's a good little 'un, yes," Ragetti said, lightly scooping up his new best friend. The hedgehog was surprisingly tame; once he got it in the protective curve of his bony hands, it simply sat, looking up at him with little oilspot eyes. The ones he remembered from England had always been gray and brown, but this one was pitchy-like, from quills to fur. Of course, the ones he remembered from England would also have gone into a little spiky ball at being touched. 

Content now with the turning of the earth and his place on it, Ragetti sat down on the stone floor. The thing had dashed away from him once he'd gotten close, and had led a crazy chase up a few of the stairwells that looked to be built right into that outer wall--which meant it wasn't a wall at all, really, but a narrow living-space. If there was anyone there, they hadn't stuck their heads out to see what the brouhaha was about, not even to see who was screaming up a blue streak. At last, the spiny little creature had made a dash out the wall, and slipped into the building in the center of the courtyard. Ragetti had followed the hedgehog, shoving open the door of the building and stepping inside. Pintel had followed Ragetti, complaining all the while. That was all right. It was his old mate's way, and besides, he had a new pet.

"There you are," he cooed, lightly brushing a fingertip over the little thing's forehead. It blinked.

"I still don't see why you're havin' to go to all that running for a damned furze pig," Pintel said. "It's a load of rubbish, that's what it is. Same thing with the Captain and his bloody monkey. Animals is food, nothin' else."

"Don't you insult my Horatio by telling him he's anything like that stupid Jack!"

"... Horatio? What kind of a name is that? It's longer'n he is!"

"I dunno. You'd have to ask him. He says it's his name, and I ain't arguing with him."

"You're never gonna get tired of talking bollocks, are you?"

"Who says I'm talking bollocks? He clearly--"

_"Vî daêvâish akhâish avanghûsh anaretâish akô-dâbîsh--"_

Ragetti stared up at Pintel, his new pet momentarily forgotten. Had his fellow cannoneer just started speaking in tongues? But, no, his friend's mouth was agape but unmoving, his eyes just as blank and confused as Ragetti felt. Who the hell was that?

For the first time, he gave the little building they were in a look around. Sitting on the floor, on the opposite side of the room from where he sat, was an enormous brass cup. It sat proudly up against the wall, huge and shiny. If he were standing up, it'd probably go all the way up to his hips. The cup didn't hold water, though; it was full of fire, blazing up over its cusp and into the air, casting a ring of golden light over the wall and the floor before it. There was a bronze-colored sword hanging on the wall over it, and that had caught the light likewise; it looked like sparks were shooting up and down its blade.

Standing next to this getup were three priests, in baggy white clothes. Their heads were covered with little caps, and their faces were masked from just below their eyes to their throats by squares of white cloth. The two younger men kept right on chanting (he didn't understand a word of it, but it all sounded quite lovely). The older fellow, the one whose hair had fingers of grey running through it, cast a silent, watchful glare in their direction.

"Wossat?" Pintel muttered. For all his talk of being in temples and churches, this was the first time he hadn't yelled since they'd gotten there.

"It's the altar," Ragetti said, whispering along with him. His fingers unconsciously skimmed over the fringe of quills on Horatio's back. "That's sacred fire, symbolific of their God Hisself. They's prayin' over it, making sure it stays pure and holy-like."

"Seems mighty foolish to pray to a blinkin' fire."

"It ain't the fire they're praying to, it's the God. Do I got to explain every little thing to you?"

The old priest spoke, and to Ragetti's surprise, he could understand it well enough. "You pair can tell Peter's men that we have already paid our tribute. We do not convert. We are no danger to the Orthodox clerics, and we do not even complain when they tear down our Towers of Silence. His men have no right to harass us in our holy places."

"Towers o' what?" Pintel asked. Instead of looking to the priest, though, he was looking at Ragetti for an answer. The gangly man shrugged, and gave Horatio a little thoughtless pet.

"The stone towers with birds flying around them. You must have seen them, they are visible from anywhere on the island. That is how we take care of our dead, sir. We even let the Orthodox clerics desecrate our dead, you see? Tell your masters not to send more people here. We are no danger."

"Uh." His friend stared at the masked priest, his yellowed eyes as blank as fog. Ragetti, who had known him since their time back in the King's navy, dimly recognized this expression as Pintel being thoughtful. "I don't rightly know what your meaning is, mate. We's only here on account of Barbossa needin' to speak to someone, and honestly, I'm not too sure what it is he's after. He's a bit... cagey."

"Cagey," Ragetti supplied, and tickled Horatio's tummy. The little creature flipped on its spiny back, and uttered a happy squeak.

"Not here in Peter's name..." The masked priest shut his dark eyes, as if he were thinking too hard to see. The only sound in the hot little room was the rhythmic chanting of his two younger fellows. Like a moth, Pintel slowly wandered over to the fire, and tried to crane his neck to see what was inside the altar. When he leaned too close, one of the priests reached forward, and gave him a hard slap on the back of his mostly-bald head.

"Oi! What's the big--"

The older man opened his eyes. "That fire is the sum and spirit of our God. We wear our veils to protect the fire from impurities--spit, sweat. It is bad enough that two unbelievers are here, although you are clearly blessed, young man. Spiked dogs are particularly holy."

Ragetti grinned. "Horatio says you're gonna give 'im a big head if you don't knock it off."

He nodded, like he understood exactly what the cannoneer was talking about. "Very well. I will see this Barbossa. He is outside?"

* * *

Bootstrap Bill did not speak up again, not for the moment. He hadn't _meant_ to tweak Barbossa--his personal goal of late was not to grab onto that old tiger's tail if at all possible--but apparently, he'd done it successfully. The simple mention of Jack Sparrow had sent his new captain into a long-winded lecture, and a second mention had driven him to silence. A third might well be dangerous. Hector was of an unreliable humor. Something that he might laugh off on Monday might become an offense worth shooting over by Thursday, depending on what had come to pass, or who was doing the offending. Given the tender feelings that Barbossa bore for him, Turner was damned lucky that he wasn't already marked for a keel-hauling. 

When his captain fell silent, then, so did Bootstrap. He kept his gaze meekly on the hard-packed earth, and his mind up and away, thinking of Maggie and William... and, ah, the maelstrom that struck him when he did that! There was guilt over leaving them behind, worry over their conditions, and a lonesome, painful sort of love... both for what he did for a living, and for the pair of them. He almost meditate on this last, focusing all his energies on it, until the sound of the shutting door broke him from his reverie.

He looked up, and saw an older man standing there, all in white. He had a short cap on his head that didn't cover all his graying hair, and oddly, a sort of mask that was draped over his face and his throat. From behind, he heard Barbossa straighten up.

The priest--with clothing like that, that was all Bill imagined he could be--reached for the nape of his own neck, and undid the ties on his mask. He took it from his face, and folded it up in a few brief motions. To Bill's surprise, the man was hiding a beard beneath it--short, curly, and well-kempt, especially for a man who was used to seeing the scraggly facial hair of pirates. "My name is Mehrvand," he said, tucking his mask into a pocket. "I am the keeper of the Atar in this temple. I have been told that a Barbossa is here for speaking to someone. If this is so, tell me his name and I will take you to him."

"I'm thinkin' that you'll do better than anyone for a bit of conversation," Barbossa said, stepping forward. He brushed easily past Bootstrap, all but forcing him to take a step back and out of the captain's way. "I be needing to know more about Stepan Razin than anyone's currently willing to divulge."

Mehrvand appeared to flinch at the very mention of the pirate's name. "Lord Razin is not open with his secrets, especially not to one such as I."

"True, true, but you're still in a fine position to learn more than anyone not directly affiliated with the man, aye? One doesn't need to speak to a man in order to divine his purpose and intents. You're not a Tsarist, and so you're not gagged by Peter. Yet a holy man you are, and thus untouched by the Russians, else they push their dark-skinned natives a mite too far, and create an unwanted revolution. Therefore, you're in a perfect place to listen, and to tell."

Bill would never be able to deny his captain's skills of manipulation. Even though the priest did not look like he believed half of what came out of Barbossa's mouth--it was in the hard glint of his amber eyes, and the way his body stiffened, like he was getting ready for a physical attack--he didn't immediately toddle off back to his stone hut. He was considering, weighing the captain's words, seeing if they were honest enough or wanting too much.

Finally: "I might be able to tell you a thing, Mr.--"

"Captain," Hector said. His grin was wide, generous, false.

"Captain Barbossa, forgive me. I might know of Razin, but you must promise me something before I tell you anything."

"Are we bargaining, Mehrvand?"

"Of a kind. If I tell you where Razin makes berth, or anything else you want to know, you must promise me that you will use this information to ensure his death."

Turner felt mildly grateful that he was not the one being addressed; if he'd been the Captain, he might have humiliated himself by standing silent and thunderstruck. He knew little of these Zoroastrians, true enough, but until that moment, Bootstrap had held an unwavering, naive faith in the essential goodness of all clergymen. To hear one so calmly and keenly demand an assassination in exchange for a few words... well, it were enough to shock him silent. And although Barbossa likewise held his words, Bill didn't make the mistake of thinking that his captain was equally surprised. Barbossa had a far dimmer view of human nature than he. He lightly polished his fingernails over the breast of his coat, gave them a once-over to check his work, and said nothing.

"My faith is one of life," Mehrvand went on. He spoke stiffly, and with some embarrassment--though he did not outwardly show such a weakness, Bill thought he heard a blush in the old priest's voice. "Yet there are those--"

"--For whom even one such as yerself would make a blessed exception, aye?"

"If it were my choice, Stepan Razin would sail free, and no man would die by his cannons. But my will does not change what is. Razin is all but a demon made flesh. It would be best for all in the Caspian if devil and flesh were parted."

"All flesh be grass, Mehrvand. Why should I sweat to introduce Sir Razin to Davy Jones, all in yer name? With how showy he lives, death'll find him easy enough, with no interference needed."

The old priest paused, and although he'd not gotten his promise from Barbossa, Bootstrap could see that he was going to tell all he knew. There was some part of Mehrvand that insisted upon it--his sense of injustice, perhaps, or his protectiveness over his clan. In this case, Turner's instincts did not disappoint him:

"Stepan Razin is unstoppable. He has a fleet of thirty-five galleys under his command, the last I heard, and there is enough firepower on them all to turn any seaport to rubble. Which he has done many times. He is not a simple folk-hero, Captain and sailor, because he thumbs his nose at Peter. The people love him because any man can join his crew, no matter his race or his creed. They are mostly his fellow Cossacks, but I daresay that there are pure Russians and Persians on deck, and others. One of his captains is a Norwegian who claims to be a direct descendant of Baron Erlingsson. That one enjoys boiling and eating human fingers along with his crab-legs."

"Blind him," Bill muttered.

"I'm sure he's right popular with the crew," Hector said.

"That is Razin's way," Mehrvand said. "His crew are all the salt of the earth, poor men who could earn no other living. His captains and mates are all just as insane as he. They all love him, and do not question his leadership. So when he tells them to turn his cannons on their fellow Russians, they don't pause, anymore than they paused when they turned those cannons on good Persians who did nothing--"

"None o' which has to do with where his fleet makes port."

The priest glared at Barbossa, which was almost enough to make Bill laugh out loud--no one in the crew would dare to turn such a gaze on their captain. "You are in fortune, at that. Razin has just recently taken to conquering sea-ports, rather than razing them. He has declared himself the Gosudar of a new Cossack republic, which is more nonsense than I would take as the Tsar, but Peter still tolerates it. In any other week, you would have your pick of a dozen docks where his fleet might have landed. As it is, he has left his crews to their devices, and taken himself up a branching of the Volga."

"Did we pass him by?" Bill said.

"Likely no." The priest used the same gentle, respectful tones when he spoke to Bill as he did with the captain. Given that Turner was a deck-hand, and therefore unused to softer treatment, he found it touching. "The Volga has many branches. You can sail up its trunk and never see someone at the tips of the tributaries. If Razin had found you, you would know it by the fact that you were rotting at the bottom of the ocean. He does not allow new ships into his waters."

"He's never met such a ship as the _Pearl_," Hector said.

"This means nothing. Unless your ship is blessed by Ahura Mazda, it will fall at his assault. It will not be your flaw, but the best ships in the Tsar and the Shah's navies have already met with the bottom of the Caspian. His div has seen to it, you see."

"Div?" Bill said.

"Yes, a div," Mehrvand replied, and Bootstrap began to realize another reason why his captain had dragged him along: there was someone else there to ask the stupid questions. Barbossa could remain silent, and make it seem as if he knew what Mehrvand was speaking of, and only allowing the old priest to explain to this foolish, ignorant sailor what he meant. "Gods who defy their creator. It has been said by the Orthodox that Razin dealt with Satan to protect his interests and give him power, but Razin has too much respect for Yahweh and his devil to deal with them. The heathen gods are another thing. I don't know when, but he must have learned to summon the devil of the Caspian, for--"

"Nonsense." Scorn steamed in Barbossa's voice. "Were it true, I've made it me recent stock in trade to defy pagan gods. I dealt with one set off in the bloody Caribbean, and I be no worse for wear. Another kind o' devil scares me none."

"Believe it as you might. You asked for information, and information I give you."

"I asked t' know where in this damned ocean Stepan Razin is, and where he makes berth. I still ain't heard a clear answer, sin-hound."

Mehrvand sighed. "If he is not at the mouth of the Volga, then he will set sail for Kaganlyk, to the far south. It is a small fortress, and his favorite hiding-place, as the Tsarists do not know of it. Myself, I would set off for the Volga, as it is closer and a surer bet."

"And you do?" Bill said.

"I have prayed for the name of his hidden fortress, and my god has answered. Now, though, I think that I have told you all I can. You will want to come back and ask me about Eghbal, but I doubt that I shall see you again, Captain and sailor. No one has ever faced Razin twice in combat."

"Yes, yes, so I heard, but I'm no slouch when it comes to the cannons," Hector said, rolling his eyes. "I think I'll be collecting my other crewmen and gettin' outta yer beard, Mehrvand. After a night ashore, it seems we'll have a ship to catch."

_to be continued_


End file.
